


The Wild Unknown

by WritingCaryl



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:21:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,768
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27359452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WritingCaryl/pseuds/WritingCaryl
Summary: Two imperfect souls have found one another at the end of the world.  For two years after a virus wipes out most of the world's population, Carol and Daryl find themselves just trying to survive.  When they find hope in the outskirts of a community of survivors, they must decide if they can pay the price asked of them or if they're better off outside the walls.
Relationships: Daryl Dixon/Carol Peletier
Comments: 2
Kudos: 33





	1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I really wish I owned the characters from The Walking Dead, but sadly, I do not. I am simply borrowing them for entertainment. All characters belong to the creators of the series.   
  


The Wild Unknown

Chapter 1

_You ain’t leavin’ this goddamn house! Where you gonna go? What you gonna do? She’s dead, Carol! She’s fuckin’ dead, and now we’re all we got!_

She sat straight up in bed, chest heaving. Sweat beaded at her brow, and her lungs burned with each heavy breath. For a moment, she’d been back in that house, back in that room, back with _him_. He didn’t visit her nightmares nearly as often as he had in the beginning, but he still found his way in. She’d been restless, and he’d found his opportunity.

The bed shifted next to her, and she heard a sleepy, gravely groan in the dark. She was trembling, and she didn’t even realize it until she felt a warm hand against her back. Her nerves immediately calmed, and she blew out a heavy breath. 

“Another bad dream?”

“Hmm.” She bowed her head and focused on her breathing while the calloused fingertips rubbed gentle circles against her lower back. 

“S’over now. Gotta get some sleep.” 

“Time is it?”

“Ain’t quite dawn yet. Lay back down.” Carol sighed wearily, resting her head against the pillow and turning onto her side to get comfortable. It wasn’t long until his familiar arm curled around her, and he scooted up against her to bury his face against the back of her neck. His warmth took the chill out of the air immediately, and she took a shaking breath.

“We could stay here a little longer,” Carol whispered. “Just a little longer? It’s been nice here.”

“Runnin’ outta supplies. Runnin’ outta food. We been through near every house in this town. Time to move on.” 

“I know. You’re right. I just thought this was the place, you know?”

“I know. And I promised ya a long time ago I was gonna find that place for ya, didn’t I? That place you can plant a garden and hang up pictures. We’re gonna find it.” Carol turned in his arms, seeking his face in the dark, and though she couldn’t see his face, she traced the outline of his jaw with her thumb before brushing it over his lips. 

“I love you,” she whispered. “Have I told you that before?” His shoulders shook with his laugh, and he pulled her closer.

“Never hurts to hear it again,” he murmured, pressing his lips against hers. Carol sighed heavily and gave herself over to the kiss. His hands wandered down her bare hips and over her ass. She could feel him, hard against her thigh, and her breath caught when he brought his hand behind her knee to drape her leg over his hip. 

“Thought you wanted me to get some sleep,” she whispered against his mouth. That familiar tingle, the rush of heat to her core, the way her nipples pebbled up as the hair on his chest chafed against her. It was all so good and certainly a distraction from the nightmare she’d woken from.

“Long as we’re both up,” he chuckled. Carol kissed him then, throwing herself into her desire to make him feel good and to feel good in return. They’d started this so long ago, at first a clumsy tangle of trembling limbs and uncertain glances and touches. Now? It was still as exciting as the first time, but they’d gotten much better at this.

“Oh!” She giggled when his hand slid between her legs, stroking her slowly, touching her the way he had countless nights before. “Daryl, please…” 

“S’alright, sweetheart. Gonna make you feel good.” He buried his face against her neck, nipping and sucking along her collarbone, while she reached between them, curling her fingers around the base of his cock and shifting her pelvis until he slid inside. She gasped, digging her nails into his shoulders, her every nerve ending alight with need. He groaned, shuddering as her warm walls clenching around him, and he rocked his hips against hers until they were both shuddering and crying out their release.

*************************************************************************************

Breakfast consisted of what was left from the beef jerky only six months past its expiration date. While Daryl loaded up the back of pickup with three full, large gas cans, Carol busied herself with making sure she’d packed up all of the clothes they’d brought with them and a few other things they’d decided to take along as well.

They’d been in this beautiful home the longest of any of them they’d stayed in. It had been over a month, and they’d agreed right at the start that they’d only stay as long as the food lasted. It wasn’t smart to push their luck, especially with winter coming. It was sure to be colder than last year, and Carol wasn’t willing to risk getting stuck. 

Despite the fact that they were in the middle of town, the lack of people meant that wildlife and plant life had started to take over around them. There were always fresh deer tracks in the yard every morning, and Carol was certain she’d seen a family of foxes slip under the front porch of the house next door. 

She really did like this house. It was big with a wrap-around porch and a cozy fireplace. It had plenty of big rooms and one of those claw foot bathtubs. In the corner room upstairs was a partially-decorated nursery with plastic sheeting still covering the bed. Carol often made up stories in her head when she couldn’t sleep at night. Her hope was that the family had been immune and that the mom, the dad and the baby were all someplace safe. Though she knew the true story was likely grimmer, it was nice to at least think that someone else might have survived like they had and hadn’t completely given themselves over to the wild.

“You about ready?” Carol turned to see Daryl in the doorway and offered a nod in his direction

“Yeah. I think I have everything.” She scanned the room before her eyes settled on the wall by the fireplace. “Oh! Almost everything.” She hurried over to pluck the calendar off the wall. They’d found it in a shopping mall east of town. Carol had tried her best to keep track of the days and the months, and by her count, it was currently October 29th. After the new year, she was going to have to do the best she could to keep track. For now, though, it gave her some peace to at least have some grasp on time, even when the days seemed to blur together now.

She looked at him with a nervous smile. She ran her fingers through her curly brown hair to pull it back from her face for a moment. She still wasn’t used to having _so much_ hair to deal with in the morning. She missed the pixie-like cut she used to wear, though she didn’t miss the reasons why she wore it like that. Since finding _him_ , all of those anxieties and fears only came around at night when she slept, and only once in a while, like early this morning. The bad dreams were fewer and far between. She had new worries now. New fears. And if it wasn’t for Daryl, she was certain she’d have been dead a long time ago.

“Hey.” His voice was soft, the way it usually got when he was trying to ease her worries. She looked at him again, and she saw that little bashful half-smile he only ever used on her. In the beginning, she’d been lucky to get one or two words out of him. It seemed like a lifetime ago they’d met, two lost souls desperately searching for something worth holding onto in a world that died and left them to watch it rot. 

He took a couple steps toward her when she rolled the calendar up and stuck it in her jacket pocket. He reached out for her hands, a small gesture but one that meant the world to her considering how he’d been half afraid to touch her once upon a time. 

“We’re gonna find that place, alright? We’re gonna be ok.” He leaned in for a soft, slow kiss, and when he pulled away, he caught the faint hint of a grin on her lips. “You believe me?”

“Always,” she assured him.

“Good,” he murmured, looking down between them. He reached out, gently stroking his hand over the swell of her stomach. A little nudge against the palm of his hand surprised him, and his brows shot up. He searched her eyes, and she let out a little laugh. “That don’t hurt?”

“No,” she chuckled. “I’m used to it.” He smiled then, a big, wide smile that warmed her heart. It was a sight to behold, because Daryl Dixon wasn’t a man who was used to smiling. He, like her, was used to pain. It had been a part of his life from a young age, and the fact that they’d found something worth living for in a dead world was enough to make him smile a hundred times over. 

“Well, we best get goin’. Next town’s a while away, and I wanna get settled ‘fore it gets too late. Come mornin’, I’m gonna scout, and I’m gonna find us a place we can hole up ‘til the baby comes. Sound good?”

“Yeah,” she agreed with a bob of her head and a that nervous little smile twitching at her lips. “That sounds great.”


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Most apocalyptic movies back in the day had always been the same. There were always hundreds of cars blocking and lining the roads and making them difficult to travel. The reality was much different. Yes, there were a few cars here and there, abandoned long ago after running out of gas or getting a flat tire. But the roads were entirely passable save for the stray tree limb here and there that could be moved in minutes with some rope tied to the hitch.

They’d been on the road for a good hour, traveling further east than they’d been since the start. Carol was tired, and her feet hurt in her shoes. They were swollen, and she wanted so badly to take them off and stretch her toes, but the morning air was cool, and she didn’t want to risk catching a cold. They had a whole box full of medicines and medical supplies, but making them last was key. The medicine cabinet was the second thing they raided at each new house after the kitchen.

“Should have a town comin’ up. Wanna check the map?” Daryl asked after a good half-hour of driving. Carol reached for the map on the seat between them and unfolded it in her lap. She traced her finger along the road they’d been on since leaving the house, and she glanced up to check the road they were passing. She murmured to herself for a minute as she tried to find their location on the map. Moments later, she looked up at Daryl with a relieved smile.

“We’re coming up on a small town. We’ll be lucky if there’s so much as a gas station, but there should be a few houses at least.”

“We’ll stop and check it out. If there ain’t a place suitable to stay, we can grab supplies and move on.” Carol folded the map back up and put it back on the seat between them. Daryl glanced at her out of the corner of his eye when she shifted in her seat and let out a soft gasp. “You ok?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m ok.” He slowed the truck down and glanced at her for a moment. Her brow was tense, and her lips were pulled in a firm line. 

“You hurtin’?”

“Daryl, I’m ok. It’s nothing. Really.” Still, the look on her face followed by another wince did nothing to ease his concerns. Daryl pulled over onto the shoulder and slowed the truck to a stop. She looked around and then back at him. “What are you doing?”

“We got time to rest,” he said quietly, cutting the engine.

“Daryl, my pain has nothing to do with your driving. I’m fine. It’s probably Braxton Hicks.”

“It’s gettin’ close to time. You sure that’s what it is?” He brought his hand over to feel her belly. He’d read in one of those books that the belly could feel firm during a contraction, but her wasn’t quite sure if that’s what he was feeling. 

“It’s too soon,” Carol said quietly, her voice hitching up an octave when another pain hit her. 

“You sure?”

“Daryl, I’m pretty sure we’re at least a month away.” Daryl turned in his seat to face her. 

“Ain’t like we got a doctor to tell ya when the baby’s comin’. For all we know, ya could’ve been pregnant a long time ‘fore ya think. You was the one that said your period was outta whack, right?” 

“It’s not time yet,” she insisted. Part of her believed it. Part of her _needed_ to believe it. She hadn’t been sure she could even get pregnant again after all of the abuse she’d suffered at Ed’s hands. He’d tried to get her pregnant for years after Sophia was born, and it had never happened. Carol had prayed every night she wouldn’t get pregnant, and she wondered if the beating he’d given her three weeks after Sophia’s birth had had anything to do with it. He’d left her with a half-moon bruise from the toe of his boot right under her belly button. She’d bled for a day after that.

So when the nausea and tender breasts and extreme fatigue had finally raised some red flags and she’d scrounged around a dirty house for a pregnancy test, she’d been shocked and scared when those two lines showed up as clear as day. 

And Daryl had a point. Period math had become next to impossible, what with all the other worries they had. Shelter. Food and water. Coming upon other survivors who’d rather attack and steal on sight. Needless to say, life had been stressful. 

Still, she was certain she had at least a month to go. By her logic, the longer she stayed pregnant, the better chances the baby would survive. But, survive for what? It was a question that kept her awake many nights. What was next? Was this all there was? Surviving house to house, day to day? Keeping the lights low and the curtains drawn in case there was anybody else out there who might be desperate enough to bother them in the middle of the night?

“They stopped,” she assured him. Daryl didn’t look convinced. Instead, he put his hand on her belly again and felt the baby move. “He’s still roaming around pretty good in there. They usually stop moving a lot close to the birth. Not much room. Resting up for delivery, I guess.” Daryl looked down at her stomach and then at her face, and the worry that creased his brow made her heart ache. She put her hand over his. “I’ve done this before.” And there it was. They didn’t talk about it much. Rather, they didn’t talk about _her_ much. She didn’t talk about Sophia often, and Daryl only knew as much as Carol had been able to tell him. The pain was still raw for her, and the grief hit her in waves, sometimes out of nowhere.

“I know. M’sorry. Just worried about ya.” Carol squeezed his hand.

“We’ve been through a lot together, and we’ve gotten through it. We’ll get through this. We will.” She looked out the front window then and back to Daryl. “Come on. We’re not far. Let’s get there and see what we can find.”

*************************************************

It was a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of town. There was church with boarded up windows. Red spray paint covered the big, wooden front doors with a familiar symbol they’d seen a hundred times over since the beginning. Or was it the end? The red symbol meant that the building was being used as temporary storage for the dead until a mass grave could be dug. In some cases, the bodies were never removed. 

They usually avoided those areas at all costs. 

Two blocks down from the church was a row of six houses. They didn’t appear to have been looted, and there wasn’t a single broken window that they could see from the street. Still, there was always a chance there were people there, like them, that didn’t trust strangers. 

Sometimes they could hear the gunfire at night. Sometimes they could hear the whoops and hollers and laughs. They could almost be mistaken as the calls of wild animals. Almost. They hadn’t heard them so much in the last month at the house Carol had loved so much. But there were people out there who had embraced the end of the world and found their place in the desolate outskirts of old cities.

The first house was a bust. Other than a couple boxes of stale macaroni and some instant rice, they didn’t find much worth picking through.

The front door had been unlocked. The thick layers of dust on every surface in the house and how the remnants of the last occupant’s meal was dry and molded on the dishes at the table told that they’d gotten out in a hurry and hadn’t looked back.

The second house was a little better. There were some canned vegetables and some trail mix. The third house was practically a goldmine. There was a full cellar of food ranging from glass jars of canned vegetables and salsas, cans of soups and ready-to-eat pastas, and last but not least, a whole shelf of M.R.E.s. 

Carol had found those first. At first, the thought of them turned her stomach. She, Ed and Sophia had rationed those to one per person, per day at the start out the outbreak. Then Sophia died. Then Ed panicked and rationed them to one to share every other day. When Ed died, Carol still had a whole box full of those meals, and she survived for nearly a month on those before she ventured out for more supplies and found Daryl instead.

It was food, and she wasn’t going to turn away a meal. She had to keep her strength up for the baby, and there was more than enough food in the cellar to get them through the next two to three months easily, depending on how well they rationed it.

The house had some pressing issues to take care of. The kitchen was a wreck that needed cleaning, but the body in the back bedroom needed tending to first. So, while Carol opened up the curtains to let a little light in the place, Daryl removed the body and dug a shallow grave for a proper burial. 

Carol wasn’t sure how many graves they’d dug together since they’d met, but each one got a little easier. Each one, they felt a little more removed from. It was a sad fact that death was all around them and the fact that they were still living and breathing felt somehow _unnatural._ It was unsettling to feel so far removed from the other people that had once inhabited the world, to feel as if they’d been set apart from them all, even before. 

But they’d found each other, two people the world hadn’t managed to kill, and they’d made a life together. It was a struggle sometimes, but the struggle was normal now. And as long as they had each other at the end of the day, they counted themselves lucky to have survived to wake another morning.

“Back room’s gonna have to air out if we wanna try to use it,” Daryl muttered, coming in the door and immediately stripping his soiled shirt off. “Master bedroom’s fine. Dusty, but that ain’t nothin’ we can’t work around.”

“We can work on that tomorrow,” Carol said with a nod, arranging some of the food she’d brought up from the cellar in the cabinet next to the stove. She nodded toward the window above the sink. “Storm’s coming.” Daryl peered out to see the dark clouds rolling in. “It’s gonna be a big one. Might as well settle in. I’ll help you bring everything out of the truck.”

“Nah, you ain’t. You’re gonna sit down and put your feet up.” Carol raised an eyebrow out at him. “Wasn’t a question. Wasn’t an hour ago you was havin’ pains in the truck. I’ll get our stuff brought in. You sit down.” He took her by the hand, and the little half-smile that she gave him showed her appreciation. His heart was in the right place. The last man that ordered her around had done it because it made him feel powerful to make her feel so small and useless. Daryl was terrified about what the future held for them, and she could see the guilt in his eyes every time she so much as had a bout of morning sickness. He was terrified of losing the only thing he had in the world, so of course he was going to want her to take it easy. 

Still, she made a spectacle of flopping back on the couch and putting her feet up. She sighed dramatically and folded her arms behind her bed. 

“Would you put that pillow behind my back?” she asked, teasing him with a flirty batting of her eyelashes. Daryl smirked but said nothing. He fluffed the nearest throw pillow and tucked it behind her when she leaned forward. She settled back and placed her hands on her belly. “You know, a girl could get used to this.”

“Well, ya better. Don’t want ya leavin’ this couch for much of nothin’ the rest of the day.”

“Doctor’s orders?” Carol asked with a breathy laugh. 

“I imagine if there was a doctor around, he’d agree with me,” Daryl said with a nod. “I know you’re stubborn, but will ya please just do this for me?”

“Since you asked so nicely,” she teased. 

“Good. I’ll be right back.” He started for the door, but Carol tugged on his hand. 

“Hey. Will you do something for _me_?” She batted her eyelashes at him. 

“What’s that?” She smiled then, tugging him down to sit beside her. She leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to his lips. The kiss lingered for a moment, and when she pulled back, she slowly opened her eyes, and her smile widened.

“Ah,” she sighed, brushing her thumb across his lower lip. “I’m feeling better already.”


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

_She was down to two weeks’ worth of MREs and two cases of water. If she rationed it all, she’d be set for a month. But the weather was turning, and the violence from the city was getting closer and closer. Yesterday, she’d woken up to find one man dead in the street with a bullet in his back._

_She’d been putting off leaving for far too long. When Ed died, she’d meant to pack up and leave and never look back. But Sophia’s grave was there. Out in the back yard, under the big oak tree she used to climb up and hide in when Ed would come home drunk and start getting violent. Weeds and grass had started to fill in the cracks in the mound of dirt on her grave._

_It felt like yesterday. The fever had hit so suddenly. She’d felt fine, even when they closed the schools. Even when the army stepped in and started patrolling neighborhoods to ensure people were staying home, she’d been fine. And then one morning, she wasn’t. Carol had gone in to check on her, and her pajamas were soaked with sweat, and she was shivering in her bed._

_Three hours later, she was gone._

_And then Ed was gone. And Carol had waited for death. And waited. And it never came._

_She remembered something on the news before the stations snowed out. According to one of the final broadcasts, some people seemed to be immune. There weren’t many, but there were some, and the only way they could possibly have known that was to be around someone who wasn’t._

_She wondered how many people out there had buried a child or a spouse or a parent? She wondered how many people found themselves utterly alone and wondering if death might be a kinder fate than surviving in a world that seemed to want to die around them. There were still others out there. She could hear them, mostly at night. Gunfire and screams would keep her awake. It was time to move on._

_When she stepped out into the yard and up by the grave beneath the old oak tree, she felt sick. Coming out to Sophia’s grave didn’t make her feel better. It didn’t give her peace. If anything, it left her with the horrifying memory that the last memory she had of her daughter was her eyes going wide as she took her last gasps of breath. Then her face relaxed, the color drained from her cheeks, and she looked to her mother and went still. That was what she saw when she stood by that grave, not the happy, bubbly little girl who’d given her life a purpose when everything else was horrible and painful._

_“I’m so sorry, Sophia,” she whispered, as raindrops began to pelt down into the red dirt over Sophia’s grave. “I don’t know why it had to be you and not me. Since you left, all I’ve done is wait to die. I prayed for it, even. But I’m still here, and maybe…maybe that’s for a reason. Lying around waiting to die is no way to make up for the fact that you’re not here. So I have to go. I have to find that reason to stay.” She took a shaking breath and wiped the hot tears from her eyes. “I think about you every day. That won’t change. I just can’t stay here anymore. I love you. So much. My beautiful baby girl.”_

_Lightning struck overhead, and the limbs of the old tree began to sway in the wind. A damp chill settled over Carol. She hunched her shoulders and stuffed her hands into her jacket pockets._

_“I’ll do my best, Sophia. I’ll keep going for you. I promise.”_

*~*~*~*~*~*

Thunder shook the windowpanes, and Carol jolted awake from the same spot on the couch she’d settled over an hour ago. She could hear Daryl puttering around in the kitchen, and her stomach growled when she smelled something cooking. 

He’d rigged a rack up in the fireplace, and hot flames curled and licked around the sides of a pan. She noticed two bowls set out on the coffee table when she sat up to stretch, and that was when Daryl came walking in with a mug in each hand.

“Coffee?” Carol asked, looking up at him with wide eyes.

“Nah, it’s tea. Probably stale as hell, but it’s warm. Got more hot water if ya want another cup.” Carol hummed her thanks and accepted the cup. She blew over the top, and the steam soaked into her skin. She closed her eyes and inhaled the sweet aroma before taking a tiny sip. It wasn’t as sweet as it smelled, but it wasn’t bad. It was something to warm her belly, and she couldn’t complain about that.

“It’s good.” Carol’s voice was soft and sleepy, and she smiled a little to herself when Daryl put his cup on the table and crouched down in front of the fireplace to pull the pan out to sit on the stone hearth. He lifted the lid, and the bubbling soup let out a cloud of steam. 

He ladled some soup out into both bowls and put them aside to cool. Carol watched him as he worked, smiling when he got up and came over to sit next to her on the couch. He brought his arm around her shoulders in that now comfortable way he did when they curled up together at night. And her heart swelled at the memory of the months after they’d first met, curled up under sleeping bags with enough space between them for another person. She could still remember the first time she reached out and touched him, and he’d pulled away as if he’d been burnt. It hadn’t been easy, but over time, he’d opened up about the abuse he’d suffered as a kid, and in turn, she’d told him about her life with Ed and how she couldn’t remember what it felt like to be held by somebody.

That night, they’d tried something new. They’d curled into each other and slept the best either of them had slept since it all happened. They’d come a long, long way.

“You ok?” Daryl gave her shoulder a squeeze. 

“Just thinking,” she yawned. She lifted her head and stared at him a moment. “Do you think about it?”

“Think about what?”

“We’re healthy. We didn’t get sick. Do you think the baby’ll be ok? Or do you think maybe the sickness is still out there?” 

“Try not to think about that.” Daryl gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Don’t do no good wonderin’ what if. We worry about today. We’ll worry ‘bout tomorrow when it gets here.” Carol nodded then and looked down. She put her hand over her belly and felt a gentle kick. 

“I can’t bury another one, Daryl. I can’t.” 

“Hey,” he murmured, pulling her close. “Everything’s gonna be alright.” Carol knew he was just as worried about the future as she was, but he was right. It did not good to worry about what _could_ happen. They had to live in the moment, because worrying about something that might never happen did nothing to help them in their current situation.

“We need to talk about it.”

“Carol, I…”

“No. We do.” She turned in her seat so she could face him, and Daryl slowly pulled his arm from around her shoulders. She could see the worry lining his brow, and by the way he bit the inside of his cheek, she knew he was desperate to talk about something, anything else. But this had to be talked about. “First, if anything happens to me…”

“It won’t.”

“If it _does_ ,” Carol continued, “I need you to promise me you’ll find a place he can call home. I know that’s the plan. But if I don’t make it that long, I need to know you’ll keep going and find a place you can stay and raise him.” He wasn’t looking her in the eye anymore. Instead, he was avoiding her gaze. She reached out and placed her hand against his cheek. “Look at me.” It took him a moment, but he dug deep and managed to look up at her, and she could see the pain in his eyes. “I don’t plan on going anywhere, but I needed to say it. Ok?” He nodded. “You’ll find a place.”

“I will,” he promised. “And if somethin’ happens to me, you’re gonna keep goin’ too. You already lost your little girl. You survived that. If somethin’ happens to me, I know you’re gonna be alright. This baby needs you a lot more’n it needs me.”

“That’s not true,” Carol whispered. “I know you don’t like to talk about your past, but what your dad did to you…that’s not you. You’re going to be a great dad.” She took his hand in hers and gave it a squeeze. Then, her smile faded, and she looked down, placing her other hand on her stomach. “If something happens to him, I don’t think I could live with it. I barely survived Sophia. If I lose him, I don’t…”

“I’m gonna be there. We’ll help each other,” he assured her. “It’d be the worst pain, next to losin’ you. Don’t wanna think about it. But I promise, if somethin’ happens, I ain’t gonna let you lose yourself. Ain’t gonna lose myself, neither. We’re gonna get through whatever happens together. Right?” She nodded and wiped away a tear. “He’s gonna be fine. He’s got a mama and a daddy that’s immune. Good chance he will be, too, right?”

“Well, I’m no doctor, but…that sounds reassuring.”

“Well, then keep thinkin’ it ‘til ya believe it, alright? Not much longer, he’ll be here, and we’ll find that place we’re gonna call home. We’re gonna make it happen, Carol. Whatever it takes.”


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

_It had been twenty-six days since she’d spoken words aloud. The last words she’d uttered had been to her daughter’s grave before leaving home for the last time. She found herself humming as she drove or walked, and seemed such a funny thing when she’d catch herself doing it. The world was so still. The quiet was too loud. The only thing that kept her mind steady and focused on tomorrow was the scrape of shoe soles against concrete, the crackling whir of tires over dried leaves littering the highway. The world was dead, but she was alive, and the noises kept her from going crazy in the quiet._

_She’d slept the last three nights in the back room of an abandoned grocery store. When the virus first hit and people started panicking, it had clearly been one of the first places hit. The shelves were bare. Produce was rotting in the bins. The few items abandoned in the meat coolers were now green and putrid. But someone had set up a cot in the back room of the store, and Carol had taken shelter through a particularly vicious storm. But food was running low, and she had to keep moving._

_She’d found a drug store that still had product in the windows, so she’d parked the old Jeep Cherokee behind it and had come in front behind._

_Most of the painkillers were gone, but she managed to find a few bottles under the shelves. She found antibiotics and syringes. She found first aid kits and boxes of bandages. She took a sweep around the rest of the place, loading up on soap and shampoo and boxes of tampons and pads. She left a few packages, because while it felt like she was the only woman left in the world, she knew she wasn’t. There were people out there. Close. She’d heard screaming in the night, and she had stayed still in the dark and prayed her car would still be there come morning._

_By the time she loaded the back of the Jeep up with supplies, the sun was high in the sky, and her stomach was rumbling again. So, she topped off the tank with the contents of one of the red gas cans in the back of the truck and started off down the street._

_To her surprise, three men darted out across the road, laughing wildly and disappearing down an alley between a bar and an old insurance office. Carol’s heart raced, and she slammed on the brakes in case anyone else came running out. For a moment, she wondered if she’d hallucinated the whole thing. But, as she brought the car to a slow crawl down the street, she peered down the alley just to see one of the men turn a corner a disappear behind the bar. Her heart pounded in her chest, and she reached for the glove compartment. Inside was a small handgun. She’d never shot a gun in her entire life until a week ago. It had been Ed’s, and she’d never touched the thing. But when she’d been hunkered down in the back of an old trailer, she’d heard someone—or something—prowling around outside. She’d stuck her arm out the window with the gun in her hand, pulled the trigger, and soft footsteps went scampering off toward the woods. Probably a coyote, she’d thought, but she hadn’t been willing to take any chances._

_She peered down the sidewalk the other men had just come running from, and it was then that she saw someone slumped in the doorway of a barbershop. For a moment, he was so still she wondered if he was dead. But when she saw him lift his head wearily, only to slump back down, she found herself cutting the engine and rushing out of the Jeep._

_With the gun firmly tucked in her back pocket, she approached the figure. He was cloaked in a poncho and had nothing on him but a crossbow. His lip was busted, his nose was bloody, and she could tell by the broken string on his weapon and the scratches on his hands that the men had tried to take that, too, but had failed. It was when she saw the dead man slumped against the other side of the doorway that she realized why the others had given up and fled._

_“Are you ok? Are you alone?” He lifted his head and peered up at her through shaggy hair, and she offered him a kind smile. She saw something in his pretty, blue eyes then. Despite her trembling hands and racing heart, she didn’t feel compelled to run away. He was the first person she’d seen—besides his attackers—and he looked like he could use some help._

_He stared up at her for a moment, as if trying to convince himself she was real. She reached out to try to push his hair back to get a look at his wound, and he flinched back. She pulled her hand back then and backed up a little._

_“Assholes stole my shit.”_

_“Looks like they clocked you a good one, too.”_

_“I’ve had worse,” he muttered, fishing for the pack of cigarettes in his torn shirt pocket._

_“Yeah.” Her head bobbed in solidarity. “Me too.”_

_*~*~*~*~*~*_

Carol hadn’t slept much. Daryl had gotten out of bed as quietly and gently as he could, and she’d lay there watching him scrawl a note out for her. She knew before she even read it that he was going out to look for supplies, and while she hated the idea of him going out alone, she knew going with him would only slow him down. She wasn’t feeling the best, and something had been bothering her since the moment she opened her eyes.

She hadn’t felt the baby kick once all night. He usually woke her with a kick or a nudge hard enough to jostle her from her dreams and awake the urge to rush to the bathroom to pee. She remembered well enough from her first pregnancy that close to the end, the baby didn’t move as much, but even that knowledge didn’t help ease her worries much. 

Still, by the time the sunlight filtered in through the slats in the blinds, she still hadn’t felt so much as a hiccup. When she ran her hand along her belly and pressed her fingertips gently against the spot his little foot had been nudging her lately, she didn’t get the usual squirm or stretch she typically got. 

She pulled her hand away and tried not to think about it. 

She stayed under the covers until her stomach growled, and as soon as she was up on her feet, she felt a sharp twinge in her back. It caught her off guard, and she toppled forward, hands breaking her fall on the mattress as her knees dug into the sides of the bed. She closed her eyes and sucked in a sharp breath before releasing it, and as the pain subsided, she straightened and started out of the bedroom.

It wasn’t easy to keep her mind on other things. The fact that her back and hips ached from how low the baby was made it difficult to think of anything else. She could tell the baby had dropped. The likelihood that she was giving birth in the next week as opposed to the next month seemed greater, and while she’d been mentally preparing herself for the worst, she still wasn’t quite ready to get it all over with. For as uncomfortable as she was and as eager as she was to feel normal again, the _after_ was what kept her awake at night. The what ifs were loud and frightening.


End file.
